Business and Economy
PH did not sign agreement for China-led bank establishment
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MANILA – The Philippines did not sign the articles of agreement for the establishment of the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB).
Finance Secretary Cesar V. Purisima, however said that the country “remains a prospective founding member.
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“As the deadline to sign is on December 2015, the Philippines is taking the time given to prudently consider its membership. Not signing today does not preclude us from signing before the aforementioned deadline,” Purisima said in a statement quoted in a Philippine Daily Inquirer report.
Other countries who have not yet signed the agreement includes Denmark, Kuwait, Malaysia, Poland, South Africa and Thailand.
“We do hope that AIIB will function based on purely financial basis, and not political,” Purisima said at a Center of Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) conference in Washington, D.C.
This is amid the tensions between China and the Philippines who are both claimant countries in the disputed territories in the West Philippine Sea.
